The original poster simply asked for the BEST way to loosen root bound plants. I've done my best to describe the best way, based on plant physiology. Injuring roots by tearing, crushing, etc. causes a different reaction from the plant than the simple creation of new roots at a sharp cut. There are many other methods, obviously. And plants will typically recover from a certain amount of harsh handling. The 'standard', however, and the one that follows the guidelines for BMPs (best management practices) is to use a sharp tool of some kind to cleanly sever the roots, rather than mangle them. Why should we do something that causes injury to the plant, instead of accomplishing something beneficial? All of this reminds me of a landscape worker who was in charge of installing several hundred 1 to 7 gallon container plants at a commercial project. His method was pretty unique: He removed the plants from their pots, laid them on the ground and proceeded to smash the root ball with his foot. Ay-yi-yi

Ken - No plant likes or prefers to have their roots disturbed in the immediate, so it should not be a surprise that pothos isn't the sole outlier. That a plant endures some minor and temporary stress is not all that unlike people dieting, exercising, or going to the ER to get sutures to close a wound, or have a broken bone set and fixed in place temporarily. While these things might be uncomfortable or stressful in the moment, it is in our own best interest to endure the temporal discomfort to avoid future issues more serious. "In the case of Pothos, smaller is better." No, this cannot stand as an accurate statement w/o some qualification. First, to make the statement you absolutely must assume that the medium being used is so water-retentive that up-potting to a pot anything other than slightly larger than the former jeopardizes root health. Using the media I and many others here use would allow a grower to plant the tiniest of seeds or a minuscule cutting in a 55 gallon drum filled with grow medium. You might not yet understand plants cannot be over-potted when using grow media incapable of holding water between soil particles; or that the closer a grow medium comes to having no water in the voids between soil particles, the less consideration need be given to the potential of over-potting. "The idea that all plants need regular repotting is not true." Well, if what you said is true, it's true only in the same sense that you needn't change the oil in your vehicle, change your infant's diaper, or avoid trying to leap from tall buildings using a bed sheet as a parachute. Let's use pothos as an example. As the roots reach the point of root congestion that allows the grower to lift the root/soil mass from the pot intact, the congestion will have begun to limit A) growth rate B) the plant's level of vitality C) its ability to defend itself against pathogens biotic and abiotic D) and perhaps eye appeal, though the greater diminishment of how it looks will come as root congestion is allowed to increase. If Mother Nature thought it was best for plants to grow on a tangled and congested mass of roots, plants would sit immediately atop tightly compacted cubes and spheres of roots. Nowhere in nature do roots grow in a compact mass unless there are influences preventing them from occupying whatever volume of soil is required to satisfy their need for water/ nutrients/ anchorage. "It depends upon what type of plant, it is" No, it does not. All terrestrial plants that I know of suffer stress when roots are congested and the stress level increases in relation to the level of congestion. Potting up relieves only a fraction of the stress caused by root congestion, this, because it does not address congestion in the center of the root mass. Potting up is a half-measure that ensures the plant remains stressed until such time that a pair of hands gets into the center of the root mass and relieves the congestion and hopefully fixes the problem roots. In order to relieve all stress affecting rootbound plants, they must be fully repotted, which includes completely or partially bare-rooting the plant; removing large unnecessary roots that serve no purpose other than plumbing; and other problematic roots (crossing, j-hooked, encircling, girdling, roots growing straight up/down, and roots growing back toward the center of the root mass); and a change of all or almost all of the grow medium. I happily acknowledge that it makes more sense to work toward relieving root congestion by dividing some plants or by vegetative propagation, which in a sense makes your statement in bold immediately above true, but no plant grown under conventional container culture remains unaffected or unlimited by root congestion beyond the point where the root/ soil mass can be lifted from the pot intact. It is absolutely essential to fully address root congestion in order to fully eliminate the stressful effect it has on plants. I recognize that the stress associated with root congestion is often used as a tool to force the plant to produce a greater profusion of blooms, limit the plants growth rate, or produce any of several physiological reactions deemed desirable by the grower, but stress is a signal the plant is operating at or beyond the limits it was genetically programmed to tolerate; so, from the plant's perspective, stress is always a limiting factor, even if the effects of stress pleases the grower. "They will develop root rot, if given too much soil." Again the comment deserves qualification, and is based on the assumption that all available media are inherently limiting due to a tendency to hold an excessive amount of water. We can only cause root rot by over-potting if A) the medium is inappropriately water-retentive for the task at hand, or B) watering habits are inappropriate. Not all media is inappropriate and not all growers over-water. I'm not sure how you'll square the idea that allowing a plant to continue to suffer the stress of root congestion in order to avoid root issues related to over-potting is a good thing, when both can very easily be avoided by simply using a healthier and more appropriate grow medium. Al, who is not an ALCA certified interior plantscaper. ;-)

Thank for your response, Ken. Here in Italy it seems that even if you go in person to a nursery to pick up your plants, you aren't allowed to choose for yourself; the nursery people prepare your order for you... and it does seem to me not unsusual-or incomprehensible! -that one plant will tend to be in some way not ideal. After all, for the nursery people,it makes sense to want to "get rid of" a tree that has out-grown it's pot. I can't say that I WANT to dig it up again; it's supposed to rain all week, and I have another order from another nursery on the way,so it's not like I have time on my hands! No, I didn't get the roots to look like the ones in your photos: you could not see the root structure of the plant in question; it was all knitted together in a ball; i.e., the main roots were totally obscured by the mass of little feeder roots and soil. I hacked into it making deep cuts vertically from the top surface to the bottom. I didn't make the "X" cut at the bottom, however. Instead I teased the bottom surface violently with my knife, and also made cuts along the bottom perimeter. I pruned the few visible larger roots, too.So I definitely messed around with it more than the people on the YouTube videos that I watched did,though, I repeat that it was by no means "clean and linear " like the roots in your picture. My idea of taking a saw to it would be just to totally saw off an inch or so from the bottom of the rootball. But if redbuds aren't all that picky, I'd rather just move on and let it be,because maybe I'm just being paranoid. Thinking back, over the years I certainly have planted some badly root-bound specimens! One of my first trees, bought at a discount at a local garden center (what a noob!) was a Kwanzan, so badly over-grown that it couldn't stand up because of the roots poking out the bottom.It's huge, now,growing just fine.

Reporting would be best in late June of 2017. Repotting involves removing the plant from the pot, removing ALL soil front around the roots, untangling roots and pruning problematic ones that are growing in circles or J hooked. You can then put it back in the same pot or a new pot with fresh soil. Read up on the 5:1:1 mix here (5 parts pine bark fines, 1 part peat, 1 part perlight). My scheffera loves it. It also looks as the plant was not getting enough light for a long time. Hense why it looks the way it does. It also is currently not getting enough light as can be seen my the yellowing leaves. after reporting next June, I'd cut the top back a couple feet (leaving some leaves) which should force it to backbud lower on the tree and become fuller. Id also place it outside in the summer months in an area that receives only ambient light from the sky and no direct sun. You can keep it outside as long as the nighttime temps stay generally above 55°. as for right now, I'd throughly flush the soil a few times (add enough water so it flushes through the pot coming out the drain holes), get some dyna gro foliage pro 9-3-6 and try to get it in a spot where it gets more light. This is a tough time of year due to lack of sunlight and the plant isn't is the great shape to be going into the winter months.